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Unlike Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel doesn’t have a Change Case button for changing capitalization. However, you can use the UPPER, LOWER, or PROPER functions to automatically change the case of existing text to uppercase, lowercase, or proper case. Functions are just built-in formulas that are designed to accomplish specific tasks—in this case, converting text case.
How to Change Case
In the example below, the PROPER function is used to convert the uppercase names in column A to proper case, which capitalizes only the first letter in each name.
-
First, insert a temporary column next to the column that contains the text you want to convert. In this case, we’ve added a new column (B) to the right of the Customer Name column.
In cell B2, type =PROPER(A2), then press Enter.
This formula converts the name in cell A2 from uppercase to proper case. To convert the text to lowercase, type =LOWER(A2) instead. Use =UPPER(A2) in cases where you need to convert text to uppercase, replacing A2 with the appropriate cell reference.
-
Now, fill down the formula in the new column. The quickest way to do this is by selecting cell B2, and then double-clicking the small black square that appears in the lower-right corner of the cell.
Tip: If your data is in an Excel table, a calculated column is automatically created with values filled down for you when you enter the formula.
-
At this point, the values in the new column (B) should be selected. Press CTRL+C to copy them to the Clipboard.
Right-click cell A2, click Paste, and then click Values. This step enables you to paste just the names and not the underlying formulas, which you don’t need to keep.
-
You can then delete column (B), since it is no longer needed.
Need more help?
You can always ask an expert in the Excel Tech Community or get support in the Answers community.
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How to Change Case in Excel: Upper, Lower, and More (2023)
Sometimes, you need to change the letter case of a text for proper capitalization of names, places, and things. In Microsoft Word, it’s easy to do that using the Change Case button.
However, there is no Change Case button in Microsoft Excel 🙁 Then how do you change the letter case of texts in Excel? How much more if you need to change the letter case of texts of large data sets? 😱
Good news! Changing the letter case of text is possible in Excel, and you don’t have to manually do it at all!
Excel offers you the UPPER, LOWER, and PROPER functions to automatically change text values to upper case, lower case, or proper case 😊
Let’s do it!
Before you scroll down, make sure to download this free practice workbook we’ve prepared for you to work on.
How to change case to uppercase
To change the case of text into uppercase means to capitalize all lowercase letters in a text string. Simply put, to change them to ALL CAPS.
You can do this in Excel by using the UPPER function. It has the following syntax:
=UPPER(text)
The only argument in this function is the text. It refers to the text that you want to be converted to uppercase. This can be a reference or text string.
It’s time to open your practice workbook and put this function into action 💪
You will see a column named Original Data which contains names, places, and sentences that are written in different text case formats.
You may have encountered this in real life where you have to work with data that do not appear in a format that you want.
Let’s convert text data in the original data column into uppercase using the UPPER function.
- Double-click on cell B2 to put the cell in Edit mode.
- Type the UPPER function:
=UPPER(
- The first and only argument in the UPPER function is the text. You can type in the text string or simply click the cell reference of the text you want to convert to uppercase 😊
In our case, click cell A2. Close the formula with a right parenthesis.
The formula should now look like this:
=UPPER(A2)
- Press Enter.
You have successfully changed the text case to all caps 👍
- Fill in the rest of the rows by dragging down the fill handle or double-clicking it.
All caps in no time!
You don’t have to worry about converting text in large data sets into uppercase. The UPPER function is all you need!
But what if you need to capitalize only the first letter of the text, not all the text characters of the whole text string? 🤔No worries, Excel can help you do that too using the PROPER function!
Kasper Langmann, Microsoft Office SpecialistCapitalize the first letter using the PROPER function
As the name of the function suggests, the PROPER function converts text into proper form or case. It only capitalizes the first letter of each substring of text.
The text could be a single word. It could also be multiple words such as first and last names, cities and states, abbreviations, suffixes, and honorifics/titles.
The PROPER function follows the same syntax and arguments as the UPPER and LOWER functions:
=PROPER(text)
In a new column of our practice workbook, let’s convert the text string to the proper case 😊
- Double-click cell C2.
- Type the PROPER function:
=PROPER(
- Click cell A2 as your text. Then close the formula with a right parenthesis.
=PROPER(A2)
- Press Enter. Fill in the rest of the rows using the fill handle.
Only the first letter of each of the substrings of the whole text string is capitalized.
As mentioned above, this works best in converting first and last names, cities and states, abbreviations, and more.
You can convert the text in Microsoft Excel into the proper case in no time! 😀
Pro Tip!
Excel automatically suggests formulas as you type.
For example, you can just type “=pro” and the suggestion for “=PROPER” will appear.
Press the Tab key to input the suggested formula.
How to change case to lowercase
If you have a list that comes in all caps, you can convert them all to lowercase using the LOWER function.
This is the syntax of the LOWER function:
=LOWER(text)
Remember Column B in our practice workbook where we placed all converted uppercase text? Let’s convert that to lowercase letters.
Let’s create a new column where we will place the text converted to lowercase 👇
- Start by double-clicking cell D2.
- Type the formula:
=LOWER(B2)
- Press Enter. Fill in the other rows by double-clicking the fill handle or dragging it down.
Now all text is now in lowercase letters 👍
This is how your practice workbook should look overall ✨
Comparing the data in the original column, you can convert any text data into upper case, proper case, or lower case.
For UPPER and LOWER functions, it would just change all the text characters to upper case or lower case.
For the PROPER function, there are a couple of limitations you need to be aware of ✍
As you know, it only capitalizes the first character in a text string. The limitation is that it does not know the difference between an actual word and an abbreviation – like an acronym for instance.
For example, if we apply the PROPER function to something like “FIFA”, it will return “Fifa”.
Another example would be using the suffix “md” for a medical doctor. If we apply the PROPER function to it, it will return “Md”.
This is not the desired outcome and should be kept in mind 💭
That’s it – Now what?
Nice work! Now you know how to convert text into upper, proper, and lower letter cases. You won’t have to worry about changing letter cases of large sets of data, and no more manual typing 🥳
Convert text like a pro, get work done faster, and impress your boss with this advanced skill in Microsoft Excel.
There are still so many functions in Excel that will help you save a lot of work. Learn functions you actually NEED like the IF, the SUMIF, and the most popular Excel function: the VLOOKUP function 🚀
You might be thinking 🤔 if there is an easy and quick way to learn these.
Of course! Join my FREE Excel Intermediate Training where I send you free lessons about the IF, SUMIF, and VLOOKUP function. Plus, you’ll learn how to effectively clean your data in Excel too.
Click here to join 😀
Other resources
Do you want to extract text substrings in Excel instead? Learn exactly with LEFT, RIGHT, and MID Functions in Excel. Read more here.
You can also learn how to convert numbers or dates to text to increase their readability or to bring them to a certain format. You can do that using the TEXT function in Excel! Read about Excel’s TEXT function here.
I hope this was a helpful read 👋
Frequently asked questions
You can use the UPPER function to convert small letters to capital letters.
- In a cell, type “=UPPER(“
- Click the cell reference of the text you want to convert to capital letters, then close the formula with a right parenthesis.
- Press Enter.
Kasper Langmann2023-02-23T14:55:02+00:00
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Содержание
- Change the case of text
- How to Change Case
- Need more help?
- How to Capitalize First Letter of a Text String in Excel (using Formula & VBA)
- Capitalize First Letter Using Formula
- Capitalize the First Letter of Each Word
- Capitalize Only the First Letter of the First Word Only
- Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and Leave Everything As Is
- Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and Change the Rest to Lower Case
- Capitalize First Letter Using VBA
- How to capitalize first letter in Excel cells
- Capitalize first letter using formulas
- First letter Capital, lower the rest
- First letter Capital, disregard the rest
- Capitalize first letter using Text Toolkit: Change Case
- You may also be interested in
Change the case of text
Unlike Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel doesn’t have a Change Case button for changing capitalization. However, you can use the UPPER, LOWER, or PROPER functions to automatically change the case of existing text to uppercase, lowercase, or proper case. Functions are just built-in formulas that are designed to accomplish specific tasks—in this case, converting text case.
How to Change Case
In the example below, the PROPER function is used to convert the uppercase names in column A to proper case, which capitalizes only the first letter in each name.
First, insert a temporary column next to the column that contains the text you want to convert. In this case, we’ve added a new column (B) to the right of the Customer Name column.
In cell B2, type =PROPER(A2), then press Enter.
This formula converts the name in cell A2 from uppercase to proper case. To convert the text to lowercase, type =LOWER(A2) instead. Use =UPPER(A2) in cases where you need to convert text to uppercase, replacing A2 with the appropriate cell reference.
Now, fill down the formula in the new column. The quickest way to do this is by selecting cell B2, and then double-clicking the small black square that appears in the lower-right corner of the cell.
Tip: If your data is in an Excel table, a calculated column is automatically created with values filled down for you when you enter the formula.
At this point, the values in the new column (B) should be selected. Press CTRL+C to copy them to the Clipboard.
Right-click cell A2, click Paste, and then click Values. This step enables you to paste just the names and not the underlying formulas, which you don’t need to keep.
You can then delete column (B), since it is no longer needed.
Need more help?
You can always ask an expert in the Excel Tech Community or get support in the Answers community.
Источник
How to Capitalize First Letter of a Text String in Excel (using Formula & VBA)
Apart from using Excel with numeric data, a lot of people also use it with text data. It could as simple as keeping a record of names to something more complex.
When working with text data, a common task is to make the data consistent by capitalizing the first letter in each cell (or to capitalize the first letter of each word in all the cells)
In this tutorial, I will show you a couple of methods to capitalize the first letter in Excel cells.
So let’s get started!
This Tutorial Covers:
Capitalize First Letter Using Formula
There can be two scenarios where you want to capitalize:
- The first letter of each word
- Only the first letter of the first word
Capitalize the First Letter of Each Word
This one is fairly easy to do – as Excel has a dedicated function for this.
The PROPER function, whose purpose of existence is to capitalize the first letter of each word.
Suppose you have a dataset as shown below and you want to quickly convert the first letter of each word into upper case.
Below is the formula you can use:
This would capitalize the first letter of each word in the referenced cell.
Pretty straight forward!
Once you have the desired result, you can copy the cells that have the formula and paste it as values so it’s no longer linked to each other.
Capitalize Only the First Letter of the First Word Only
This one is a little more tricky than the previous one – as there is no inbuilt formula in Excel to capitalize only the first letter of the first word.
However, you can still do this (easily) with a combination of formulas.
Again, there could be two scenarios where you want to do this:
- Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and leave everything as is
- Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and change the rest to lower case (as there may be some upper case letter already)
The formulas used for each of these cases would be different.
Let’s see how to do this!
Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and Leave Everything As Is
Suppose you have the below dataset and you only want to capitalize the first letter (and leave the rest as is).
Below is the formula that will do this:
The above formula uses the LEFT function to extract the first character from the string in the cell. It then uses the UPPER function to change the case of the first letter to upper. It then concatenates the rest of the string (which is extracted using the RIGHT function).
So. if there are words that already have capitalized alphabets already, these would not be changed. Only the first letter would be capitalized.
Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and Change the Rest to Lower Case
Another scenario could be where you want to change the case of only the first letter of the first word and keep everything in lower case. This could be when you text that you want to convert to sentence case.
In this scenario, you may get some cells where the remaining text is not in the lower case already, so you will have to force the text to be converted to lower case, and then use a formula to capitalize the first letter.
Suppose you have the dataset below:
Below is the formula that will capitalize the first letter of the first word and change the rest to lower case:
Let me explain how this formula works:
- LOWER(A2) – This converts the entire text into lower case
- UPPER(LEFT(A2,1) – This converts the first letter of the text string in the cell into the upper case.
- REPLACE function is used to only replace the first character with the upper case version of it.
Capitalize First Letter Using VBA
While using formulas is a quick way to manipulate text data, it does involve a few extra steps of getting the result in an additional column and then copying and pasting it as values.
If you often need to use change the data as shown in one of the examples above, you can also consider using a VBA code. With a VBA macro code, you just have to set it once and then you can add it to the Quick Access Toolbar.
This way, the next time you need to capitalize the first letter, all you need to do is select the dataset and click the macro button in the QAT.
You can even create an add-in and use the VBA code in all your workbooks (and can even share these with your colleagues).
Now let me give you the VBA codes.
Below code will capitalize the first letter of the first word and leave everything as-is:
And below is the code that will capitalize the first letter of the text and make everything else in lower case:
You need to place this VBA code in a regular module in the VB Editor
These are some methods you can use to capitalize the first letter in Excel cells. Based on the scenario, you can choose the formula method or the VBA method.
Hope you found this Excel tutorial useful.
You may also like the following Excel tutorials:
Источник
How to capitalize first letter in Excel cells
by Natalia Sharashova, updated on March 17, 2023
How can we change the case of the first letter from lower to upper in Excel cells? Do we have to type each character manually into every cell? Not anymore! Today I will share three methods of capitalizing first letters in your table.
I believe when it comes to text in Excel, one of the most commonly required tasks is to capitalize first letters in the cells. Whenever you have lists of names, products, tasks, or anything else, you will for sure have some of them (if not all) written only in small or capital letters.
In one of our previous articles we discussed how PROPER function can save the day. But since it capitalizes every word in a cell and lowers other letters, sometimes it can’t be a cure-all.
Let’s see what other options we have on the example of a shortlist of villains I like the most.
Capitalize first letter using formulas
Excel has lots of useful functions suitable for capitalizing first letter in the cells. However, you can’t have both, your data and formula that references it, in one cell. Thus, you need to create a helper column somewhere in your worksheet in order to place the formulas there. When it’s done, and calculations are made, you’ll be able to replace formulas with their values. Shall we begin?
First letter Capital, lower the rest
To make only the very first letter capital in Excel cell and lower the rest at the same time, start with inserting an additional column for the results. In my example it is column B. Right-click the column name (B) and choose Insert from the context menu. The column is inserted between A and C columns, and you can change its header name if there is one: 
Put the cursor into new B2 cell and input the following formula there:
Tip. It is most likely that the rest of the rows will be populated with the adjusted formula automatically. Otherwise, you can quickly copy the formula down the column by drag-n-dropping or double-clicking that small square in the lower-right corner of the cell with a formula.
Let me explain what the formula above means:
- UPPER(LEFT(C2,1)) converts the first letter of C2 cell to capital.
- REPLACE function is used to make sure that the whole text is returned with one specified letter changed — the first one in our case.
- Adding LOWER(C2) as the first argument of the REPLACE function allows us to lower all other letters:
Thus, you get properly looking cells written as sentences.
First letter Capital, disregard the rest
In order to capitalize the first letter of the cell and leave the other characters as they are, we will use the same formula as above with a little modification.
But first, again, make sure to create another column to use the formula. Then, enter the following into B2:
See, we deleted that «LOWER» part from the beginning of the formula. This little change won’t lower all the letters in a cell but will still capitalize the first one: 
Tip. Don’t forget to copy the formula down if Excel hasn’t done it automatically.
Capitalize first letter using Text Toolkit: Change Case
If you decide that you need a quicker and faster way of making first letters in Excel cells capital, you will choose wisely!
Our Change Case from Text Toolkit will look over those pretty little letters of yours. It is available in the collection of 70+ toos for Excel — Ultimate Suite:
- Download and install Ultimate Suite collection to your PC.
- Run Excel and click the Change Case tool icon in the Text group under the Ablebits Data tab:
The add-in pane will appear on the left side of your Excel window.
Manually select the range of cells where you want to change case, B2:B10 in our case.
Tip. You can select the range before running the tool. It will show the selected range in the corresponding field automatically.
Note. If you want to save a copy of your data just in case, tick off the Back up the worksheet option before making any changes.
Note. When every word in a cell (except the first one) starts with a capital letter, the add-in will not only capitalize the first character, but also lower the rest.
As you can see, capitalizing letters in Excel is not rocket science. Now you can do it in a couple of mouse-clicks and enjoy the results. Feel free to leave comments and ask questions down below 🙂
You may also be interested in
Table of contents
Thank for your suggestion
I am loving this website. Could you share the formula for capitalizing each first word in every sentence? I tried the following approach:
It capitalizes the first sentence only.
Hello!
I don’t think it’s possible to do this with a regular Excel formula. We have a tool that can solve your task in a couple of clicks — Change Case tool. It is available as a part of our Ultimate Suite for Excel that you can install in a trial mode and check how it works for free.
It will see the words as proper now and make every first word capital
I downloaded from here the Ablebits suites for excel and it works perfectly.
Thanks, I am now following you for more excellent tools.
Regards
Hey! Thanks for this, was very usefull.
I have just one cuestion: ВїWhat about thar achivement of «1,1»?
I understand why you use the number 1 for this «(LEFT(C2,1)», but, for this no . «(LOWER(C2),1,1»
Regards from Argentina!
Ignacio.
Hello!
Your question is about the syntax of the REPLACE function. Read more about this in this article.
I have below text in single cell.
commercial bank of qatar
doha bank
I need output like below in single cell.
Commercial bank of qatar
Doha bank
Hello!
Have you tried the ways described in this blog post? If they don’t work for you, then please describe your task in detail, I’ll try to suggest a solution.
Currently trying to extract the last 3 letters from a specified cell, with only the first letter from those three being capitalized.
The formula I am currently using is: =UPPER(RIGHT(B4,3))
This gets me the last three letters from a specified cell, «NES», how do I edit the formula so that only the letter «N» is capitalized while «ES» is not capitalized??
Thank you very much.
The ultimate suit is really awesome, makes the work really easy.
Hi Sir im trying to use the sentence case but that dont give what i require for example (Lecture Notes in Physics: Chiral Soliton Models for Baryons (Hardcover) )im using sentence formula and i chnages these sentence as Lecture notes in physics: chiral soliton models for baryons (hardcover)
Hi Saleem,
Please have a look at this part of the article above: First letter Capital, lower the rest
If you still have difficulties, please provide the exact formula you’re using that doesn’t work for you.
Sir I need ur help in the case of how to adjust or make the first letter capital always when I’m writing any word on my excel. Tank u
Hello!
I recommend reading the article about changing case in Excel
Hi Alexander,
Thank you so much for your formula below is exactly what I am looking for!!
=PROPER(REPLACE(LOWER(C2),1,1,UPPER(LEFT(C2,1))))
(Thank you!) & (Bless you!) = Exactly what I am thinking right now
// i was just having hard times importing some book titles
Thanks again!
can you tell me which formula u did use for the casing
Sir, I need to convert multiple sentences into sentence case. Ablebits is able to do that, but one problem: if I had intentionally capitalized the first letter of a word (for example, a proper noun such as my name Selvaraj), Ablebits converts its Upper case into lower case. Selvaraj becomes selvaraj. This is not right. I just don’t what the tool to disturb any letter that I have intentionally made caps. It should only change the first letter of the sentence into caps and leave everything else undisturbed. How to resolve this? Thank you.
One more: When you use the Ablebits, it backs up the original sheet. I don’t want that. How to solve it? Thank you.
Sir, I tried using sentence case in my file and made sure that your name had remained written correctly — i.e. Selvaraj. Only the first letter of a sentence is transformed into upper case. Other letters do not change. Please see what version of Ablebits Tools you are using and compare it with the current one (https://www.ablebits.com/downloads/index.php). Perhaps you just need an update. If you have any more questions, I will be pleased to answer them.
Hi I am using your formula =REPLACE(LOWER(C2),1,1,UPPER(LEFT(C2,1)))
how to I do it if the cell has more than one word
i.e my cell has MR A G SMITH however I wish to change to to Mr A G Smith
the formula above converts it to Mr a g smith
thank you in advance
Hello Nim!
Please try the following formula:
I hope it’ll be helpful.
Very helpful, thank you
Really appreciated Mr Alex, but whats the formula if i wish the have JOHN Doe Smith in a cell?
Hello!
Have you tried using the PROPER function? What result do you want to get?
Its only offering me option of numbers of characters. But what happens to a list of names with different numbers of characters.
Hi!
The PROPER function works on any number of characters in a cell. What is the problem?
Sorry but Tyler Durden is not a villain, great otherwise.
Thank you for the help.
God Bless You! 🙂
i need a small software for a manufacturing company can u help me.
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Источник
Apart from using Excel with numeric data, a lot of people also use it with text data. It could as simple as keeping a record of names to something more complex.
When working with text data, a common task is to make the data consistent by capitalizing the first letter in each cell (or to capitalize the first letter of each word in all the cells)
In this tutorial, I will show you a couple of methods to capitalize the first letter in Excel cells.
So let’s get started!
Capitalize First Letter Using Formula
There can be two scenarios where you want to capitalize:
- The first letter of each word
- Only the first letter of the first word
Capitalize the First Letter of Each Word
This one is fairly easy to do – as Excel has a dedicated function for this.
The PROPER function, whose purpose of existence is to capitalize the first letter of each word.
Suppose you have a dataset as shown below and you want to quickly convert the first letter of each word into upper case.
Below is the formula you can use:
=PROPER(A2)
This would capitalize the first letter of each word in the referenced cell.
Pretty straight forward!
Once you have the desired result, you can copy the cells that have the formula and paste it as values so it’s no longer linked to each other.
Capitalize Only the First Letter of the First Word Only
This one is a little more tricky than the previous one – as there is no inbuilt formula in Excel to capitalize only the first letter of the first word.
However, you can still do this (easily) with a combination of formulas.
Again, there could be two scenarios where you want to do this:
- Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and leave everything as is
- Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and change the rest to lower case (as there may be some upper case letter already)
The formulas used for each of these cases would be different.
Let’s see how to do this!
Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and Leave Everything As Is
Suppose you have the below dataset and you only want to capitalize the first letter (and leave the rest as is).
Below is the formula that will do this:
=UPPER(LEFT(A2,1))&RIGHT(A2,LEN(A2)-1)
The above formula uses the LEFT function to extract the first character from the string in the cell. It then uses the UPPER function to change the case of the first letter to upper. It then concatenates the rest of the string (which is extracted using the RIGHT function).
So. if there are words that already have capitalized alphabets already, these would not be changed. Only the first letter would be capitalized.
Capitalize the First Letter of the First Word and Change the Rest to Lower Case
Another scenario could be where you want to change the case of only the first letter of the first word and keep everything in lower case. This could be when you text that you want to convert to sentence case.
In this scenario, you may get some cells where the remaining text is not in the lower case already, so you will have to force the text to be converted to lower case, and then use a formula to capitalize the first letter.
Suppose you have the dataset below:
Below is the formula that will capitalize the first letter of the first word and change the rest to lower case:
=REPLACE(LOWER(A2),1,1,UPPER(LEFT(A2,1)))
Let me explain how this formula works:
- LOWER(A2) – This converts the entire text into lower case
- UPPER(LEFT(A2,1) – This converts the first letter of the text string in the cell into the upper case.
- REPLACE function is used to only replace the first character with the upper case version of it.
One of the benefits of using a formula is that it keeps the resulting data dynamic. For example, if you have the formula in place and you make any changes in the data in column A (the original text data), the resulting data would automatically update. In case you don’t want the original data and only want to keep the final result, make sure to convert the formula to values
Capitalize First Letter Using VBA
While using formulas is a quick way to manipulate text data, it does involve a few extra steps of getting the result in an additional column and then copying and pasting it as values.
If you often need to use change the data as shown in one of the examples above, you can also consider using a VBA code. With a VBA macro code, you just have to set it once and then you can add it to the Quick Access Toolbar.
This way, the next time you need to capitalize the first letter, all you need to do is select the dataset and click the macro button in the QAT.
You can even create an add-in and use the VBA code in all your workbooks (and can even share these with your colleagues).
Now let me give you the VBA codes.
Below code will capitalize the first letter of the first word and leave everything as-is:
Sub CapitalizeFirstLetter()
Dim Sel As Range
Set Sel = Selection
For Each cell In Sel
cell.Value = UCase(Left(cell.Value, 1)) & Right(cell.Value, Len(cell.Value) - 1)
Next cell
End Sub
And below is the code that will capitalize the first letter of the text and make everything else in lower case:
Sub CapitalizeFirstLetter()
Dim Sel As Range
Set Sel = Selection
For Each cell In Sel
cell.Value = Application.WorksheetFunction.Replace(LCase(cell.Value), 1, 1, UCase(Left(cell.Value, 1)))
Next cell
End Sub
You need to place this VBA code in a regular module in the VB Editor
These are some methods you can use to capitalize the first letter in Excel cells. Based on the scenario, you can choose the formula method or the VBA method.
Hope you found this Excel tutorial useful.
You may also like the following Excel tutorials:
- Convert Date to Text in Excel
- Convert Text to Numbers in Excel
- How to Extract a Substring in Excel (Using TEXT Formulas)
- How to Extract the First Word from a Text String in Excel
- Remove Characters From Left in Excel
You’ve probably come across this situation before.
You have a list of names and it’s all lower case letter. You need to fix them so they are all properly capitalized.
With hundreds of names in your list, it’s going to be a pain to go through and edit first and last names.
Thankfully, there are some easy ways to change the case of any text data in Excel. We can change text to lower case, upper case or proper case where each word is capitalized.
In this post, we’re going to look at using Excel functions, flash fill, power query, DAX and power pivot to change the case of our text data.
Video Tutorial
Using Excel Formulas To Change Text Case
The first option we’re going to look at is regular Excel functions. These are the functions we can use in any worksheet in Excel.
There’s a whole category of Excel functions to deal with text, and these three will help us to change the text case.
LOWER Excel Worksheet Function
=LOWER(Text)The LOWER function takes one argument which is the bit of Text we want to change into lower case letters. The function will evaluate to text that is all lower case.
UPPER Excel Worksheet Function
=UPPER(Text)The UPPER function takes one argument which is the bit of Text we want to change into upper case letters. The function will evaluate to text that is all upper case.
PROPER Excel Worksheet Function
=PROPER(Text)The PROPER function takes one argument which is the bit of Text we want to change into proper case. The function will evaluate to text that is all proper case where each word starts with a capital letter and is followed by lower case letters.
Copy And Paste Formulas As Values
After using the Excel formulas to change the case of our text, we may want to convert these to values.
This can be done by copying the range of formulas and pasting them as values with the paste special command.
Press Ctrl + C to copy the range of cells ➜ press Ctrl + Alt + V to paste special ➜ choose Values from the paste options.
Using Flash Fill To Change Text Case
Flash fill is a tool in Excel that helps with simple data transformations. We only need to provide a couple examples of the results we want, and flash fill will fill in the rest.
Flash fill can only be used directly to the right of the data we’re trying to transform. We need to type out a couple of examples of the results we want. When Excel has enough examples to figure out the pattern, it will show the suggested data in a light grey font. We can accept this suggested filled data by pressing Enter.
We can also access flash fill from the ribbon. Enter the example data ➜ highlight both the examples and cells that need to be filled ➜ go to the Data tab ➜ press the Flash Fill command found in the Data Tools section.
We can also use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + E for flash fill.
Flash fill will work for many types of simple data transformations including changing text between lower case, upper case and proper case.
Using Power Query To Change Text Case
Power query is all about data transformation, so it’s sure there is a way to change the case of text in this tool.
With power query we can transform the case into lower, upper and proper case.
Select the data we want to transform ➜ go to the Data tab ➜ select From Table/Range. This will open up the power query editor where we can apply our text case transformations.
Text.Lower Power Query Function
Select the column containing the data we want to transform ➜ go to the Add Column tab ➜ select Format ➜ select lowercase from the menu.
= Table.AddColumn(#"Changed Type", "lowercase", each Text.Lower([Name]), type text)This will create a new column with all text converted to lower case letters using the Text.Lower power query function.
Text.Upper Power Query Function
Select the column containing the data we want to transform ➜ go to the Add Column tab ➜ select Format ➜ select UPPERCASE from the menu.
= Table.AddColumn(#"Changed Type", "UPPERCASE", each Text.Upper([Name]), type text)This will create a new column with all text converted to upper case letters using the Text.Upper power query function.
Text.Proper Power Query Function
Select the column containing the data we want to transform ➜ go to the Add Column tab ➜ select Format ➜ select Capitalize Each Word from the menu.
= Table.AddColumn(#"Changed Type", "Capitalize Each Word", each Text.Proper([Name]), type text)This will create a new column with all text converted to proper case lettering, where each word is capitalized, using the Text.Proper power query function.
Using DAX Formulas To Change Text Case
When we think of pivot tables, we generally think of summarizing numeric data. But pivot tables can also summarize text data when we use the data model and DAX formulas. There are even DAX formula to change text case before we summarize it!
First, we need to create a pivot table with our text data. Select the data to be converted ➜ go to the Insert tab ➜ select PivotTable from the tables section.
In the Create PivotTable dialog box menu, check the option to Add this data to the Data Model. This will allow us to use the necessary DAX formula to transform our text case.
Creating a DAX formula in our pivot table can be done by adding a measure. Right click on the table in the PivotTable Fields window and select Add Measure from the menu.
This will open up the Measure dialog box, where we can create our DAX formulas.
LOWER DAX Function
=CONCATENATEX( ChangeCase, LOWER( ChangeCase[Mixed Case] ), ", ")We can enter the above formula into the Measure editor. Just like the Excel worksheet functions, there is a DAX function to convert text to lower case.
However, in order for the expression to be a valid measure, it will need to be wrapped in a text aggregating function like CONCATENATEX. This is because measures need to evaluate to a single value and the LOWER DAX function does not do this on it’s own. The CONCATENATEX function will aggregate the results of the LOWER function into a single value.
We can then add the original column of text into the Rows and the new Lower Case measure into the Values area of the pivot table to produce our transformed text values.
Notice the grand total of the pivot table contains all the names in lower case text separated by a comma and space character. We can hide this part by going to the Table Tools Design tab ➜ Grand Totals ➜ selecting Off for Rows and Columns.
UPPER DAX Function
=CONCATENATEX( ChangeCase, UPPER( ChangeCase[Mixed Case] ), ", ")Similarily, we can enter the above formula into the Measure editor to create our upper case DAX formula. Just like the Excel worksheet functions, there is a DAX function to convert text to upper case.
Creating the pivot table to display the upper case text is the same process as with the lower case measure.
Missing PROPER DAX Function
We might try and create a similar DAX formula to create proper case text. But it turns out there is no function in DAX equivalent to the PROPER worksheet function.
Using Power Pivot Row Level Formulas To Change Text Case
This method will also use pivot tables and the Data Model, but instead of DAX formulas we can create row level calculations using the Power Pivot add-in.
Power pivot formulas can be used to add new calculated columns in our data. Calculations in these columns happen for each row of data similar to our regular Excel worksheet functions.
Not every version of Excel has power pivot available and you will need to enable the add-in before you can use it. To enable the power pivot add-in, go to the File tab ➜ Options ➜ go to the Add-ins tab ➜ Manage COM Add-ins ➜ press Go ➜ check the box for Microsoft Power Pivot for Excel.
We will need to load our data into the data model. Select the data ➜ go to the Power Pivot tab ➜ press the Add to Data Model command.
This is the same data model as creating a pivot table and using the Add this data to the Data Model checkbox option. So if our data is already in the data model we can use the Manage data model option to create our power pivot calculations.
LOWER Power Pivot Function
=LOWER(ChangeCase[Mixed Case])Adding a new calculated column into the data model is easy. Select an empty cell in the column labelled Add Column then type out the above formula into the formula bar. You can even create references in the formula to other columns by clicking on them with the mouse cursor.
Press Enter to accept the new formula.
The formula will appear in each cell of the new column regardless of which cell was selected. This is because each row must use the same calculation within a calculated column.
We can also rename our new column by double clicking on the column heading. Then we can close the power pivot window to use our new calculated column.
When we create a new pivot table with the data model, we will see the calculated column as a new available field in our table and we can add it into the Rows area of the pivot table. This will list out all the names in our data and they will all be lower case text.
UPPER Power Pivot Function
=UPPER(ChangeCase[Mixed Case])We can do the same thing to create a calculated column that converts the text to upper case by adding a new calculated column with the above formula.
Again, we can then use this as a new field in any pivot table created from the data model.
Missing PROPER Power Pivot Function
Unfortunately, there is no power pivot function to convert text to proper case. So just like DAX, we won’t be able to do this in a similar fashion to the lower case and upper case power pivot methods.
Conclusions
There are many ways to change the case of any text data between lower, upper and proper case.
- Excel Formulas are quick, easy and will dynamically update if the inputs ever change.
- Flash fill is great for one-off transformations where you need to quickly fix some text and don’t need to update or change the data after.
- Power query is perfect for fixing data that will be imported regularly into Excel from an outside source.
- DAX and power pivot are can be used for fixing text to display within a pivot table.
Each option has different strengths and weaknesses so it’s best to become familiar will all methods so you can choose the one that will best suit your needs.
About the Author
John is a Microsoft MVP and qualified actuary with over 15 years of experience. He has worked in a variety of industries, including insurance, ad tech, and most recently Power Platform consulting. He is a keen problem solver and has a passion for using technology to make businesses more efficient.